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"- Fucks’ sake, Tony, a cop! You caught a..."
A wince. Then a wink. Two. Forcing himself out of a deep slumber, Lupin let his eyes adjust to the darkness, let his head adapt to the whirls of his migraine. He was familiar with the itchy feel of burlap bags, the confines of a car trunk, and the aches of a beatdown. Familiar enough to know he was dealing with amateurs, judging by the faulty amount of chloroform he could still faintly smell and the lack of restraints he felt on his ankles. Groggy still but ready to take action, he appraised the possibilities of escape at hand. That's when he noticed a warm body lying next to him.
"- Le Maire is going to gut you for jeopardizing the-"
His eavesdropping was cut short; the car crossed a massive bump, Lupin's head hitting the roof of the trunk and falling right back down.
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Zenigata woke up as he wakes up every morning. Dazed from a small hangover, excited over the new strategies he'll play against his nemesis, anxious over the future hospital bills he might pay if he fails, and looking into the eyes of Lupin, standing there, smug.
Today's Lupin was different, however : He was much closer than usual, his cold fingers pressing on the detective's cheek. His mouth was moving but no sound could be heard. As a matter of fact, everything felt different this morning. The air was scorching hot, the sun was blinding, and all Zenigata could see from miles around were orange shapes cutting sharply through blue. His eyes out of focus and gawking at the stretches beyond the horizon, he could hear a faint voice mumbling in the distance; "nic....d..t po....panic". He couldn't make out the words, the heat bleeding through his hair to his temples where beads of sweat were forming. A gust of fresh wind would be welcome. Whose idea was it to close the damn window ! And why was he clothed from tip-p...t-t-to... t-t-T-TOES??
Beyond the blue of his tie, beyond his shirt undone and stained with blood, beyond the creases of his worn out pants, he saw his feet, one shoe dangerously close to sliding off, and then nothing. Bare squares of unidentified vegetation and a whole lot of faraway dust. Zenigata moved his feet, tiptoed in an attempt at gauging how solid the invisible construction they were evidently standing on was; he felt nothing. He looked up at Lupin, looked down again, and in one fell swoop jumped into the mirage's arms.
"- ARGH !!!!!!!!!!” he screeched.
“- CALM DOWN ! POPS CALM DOWN OR WE'LL BOTH DIE !" he heard back.
To Zenigata's surprise, not only did the mirage offer a retort to his shout, but it was also holding him a in strong, albeit thin arm.
The detective knew that voice down to its smallest inflections, the only voice that elicited overwhelming joy and anger alike through every fiber of his being.
"LUPIN !!!!!!!! YOU ARE UNDER ARREST !!!!!!"
The echo of his own voice, reverberating through vast and empty plains as the only response to his shout unsettled him. Their faces squashed into each other, Zenigata felt rather than heard the exasperated sigh of the illusion. Unimpressed, and without a word, the ghost lifted his finger up. The detective did not have time to ponder on the corporeality of the being before him, because there, cuffed tightly, with the chain lodged over a dying tree trunk, was his very own wrist. On the flip-side and swaying to the same rhythm, Lupin was handcuffed as well. The pain of his chaffed wrist kicking in, Zenigata came to realize two things; one, that the infamous master thief, charming seductor, nefarious nemesis, and infuriating pain in the ass that was Arsène Lupin the Third, with all his mirth, his cologne smell and swagger, was actually standing-or rather dangling in front of him, and two, that the idiot played an important part in the gravitational game that was currently keeping both of their bones from crashing 200 meters down like shattering glass.
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It was supposed to be a quick job. In and out. Lupin didn't even need any help, could've done this on his own. But he liked a good entrance. Lupin built his reputation on flashy entrances, surprise appearances, quick sleight of hands, anything that would invoke the word magic, really. He'd break his timing down to the precise millisecond needed to pull off extravagant shows. And to maintain these illusions of control, Lupin needed his right hand man backing him up in the shadows. Jigen was happy to oblige. He liked good entrances as well, a smooth show of strength. It was one of these little things that made them as finely tuned as they were today.
The night air seeping cold through his bones, Jigen waited, his eye through the scope of a rifle. They were in a private area with lines and lines of warehouses, cold metal against flat dirt. Nothing much to look at. Ordinary. But Lupin had gathered enough intel about the owner to know about his smuggling ring, and knew exactly where the smuggled goods were being held, at the behest of one lady-killer. Geracci LeMaire was no small bookie to steal from, but Lupin enjoyed the challenge and its rewards.
A shot broke the quiet of the night and pulled Jigen out of his musings. He saw Lupin running out of a warehouse. Immediately, the gunman knew something was amiss. Lupin doesn't panic when things go wrong. He does not worry, even in the most dire of situations; he merely switches gears, and Jigen might've been 200 meters away looking through the scope of his rifle but he could tell the heist had been compromised from the thief's expression.
He was ready to fall back when he felt heavy metal striking his skull. One of LeMaire's goons had snuck up on him. Collapsing to his knees, he turned for a quickdraw but his opponent was faster. He heard the shot before he felt it splitting his side, and the last thing he saw before his head hit the pavement was Lupin, getting shot too. A quick job, alright.
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Lupin's a pragmatic man. A man of action. When he wakes up, dangling from a dying tree trunk facing his most persistent foe-sometimes-friend, he immediately acts out plans of escape in his head.
All things considered, he's found himself in worse situations.
It's in his nature, really, this relentless need to be free. Lupin hates restraints, drawbacks, embargoes and what not. Anything clipping his wings short. And right now, the immediate threat to his freedom is the man facing him, wincing and dangerously near a wake up and a freak out; a predictable Zenigata move. Lupin attempting to delicately lead the detective out of his torpor yields no results; Zenigata is screeching and clutching him within seconds.
"What ?" The man says, a statement rather than a question. He looks around, looks down two, three times, then repeats the same word.
"- What ?
- I know, right ? Lupin adds this time, amused as he has been time and time again by Zenigata's baffled expression.
- What did you do, Lupin ?"
Not "Where are we ?" nor "What's going on ?" but a straightforward accusation. A running gag between them. Zenigata always follows then blames Lupin. It's all part of the ritual.
" - So far, Lupin starts, All I got is, I was trying to rob LeMaire, got duped and attacked, then somebody (and there, he stopped to take a long hard look at Zenigata) locked my wrist and his, and before I could make a customary snark, I was whacked in the head, and here we are," He ends with a wave.
"- Serves you right ! That's what you get for attempting to steal from somebody !, Zenigata huffs.
-That somebody being a big evil tycoon doesn't get your engines running huh ?
-That's another topic ! Stealing from bad people's still stealing.
-That's a nice black and white morality wall you got there.
-What wall ?
-The morality wall ?
-What morality wall ?"
For an acclaimed detective, recognized for his competency, Zenigata was quite oblivious. It brought Lupin endless entertainment. The thief has another ironic comment coming before pain shoots from his arm.
"- Look, Pops, we'll discuss walls later, my wrist is seriously hurting."
And it was, swollen and red, ready to give out. Zenigata's wrist was not looking any better.
Lupin looks up.
"- The ledge isn't far away, thankfully, hope you're good at gymnastics !"
It takes them a while to adjust to Lupin's plan to knock them loose, and it's when the thief is wobbling on the detective's shoulder, himself standing on the feeble fibers of the trunk that Zenigata asks.
"- What morality wall ?"
Lupin heaves.
All things considered, he's in one of the worst situations he's ever found himself in.
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“-gen...Ji...gen...Jigen ! Jigen !”
The voice is getting louder, which doesn’t help with his splitting headache. He feels the bullet in his stomach and the blood trickling from the wound. He must be dead, because he hears the voice of the devil.
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They've been laying down on the floor for ten minutes, covered in dust and sweat, taking in the sight of the scorching sun, the events of the previous night, and the massive efforts of coordination they just performed climbing to safety when Zenigata rises. Nothing but rocky hills and the occasional tumbleweed surrounds them. Not a single sight of human impact. A seemingly infinite stretch of beige paths to nowhere. A quick look at the shadow of a poor lone cactus informs the detective that it's around 10 am. Great.
Zenigata motion to wipe sweat off his forehead when he notices it;
"-MY HAT !"
Lupin doesn't move, laid down, an arm thrown over his eyes, unresponsive. Zenigata thinks he doesn't understand the importance of the detective's trademark hat, so he repeats;
"-MY HAT !!!!"
Lupin rolls over and props himself up on his elbows. He winces a bit but it goes over Zenigata's head, too busy looking around for that cherished piece of tissue that would prevent the sun from melting his braincells, and more importantly, that simply belonged on his head. What's the point of a trenchcoat if a cool shadow over your eyes as you solve crime doesn't follow?
"-My hat is gone ! Lupin, get up !"
Lupin gets up, brushes the dust off and readjusts his clothes, because it might be the middle of the desert and he might've been shaken around in the trunk of a car, but nothing'll stop him from looking decent, if not dashing. Before he can get to the dust on his pants, Zenigata is pulling him dangerously close to the ledge, to look over.
"-My hat ! There !"
And there, just slightly out of reach, his hat, perched over a small branch, swaying softly from a small breeze.
Lupin pulls Zenigata out just as he leans down as an attempt to grab it, screaming;
"-Old man, you're insane ! You'll fall !"
And Zenigata stretches some more, unfaltering, determined to cover his cranium with his favorite headpiece. Lupin doesn't understand why he'd put them both in danger for something so trivial, but then again, it's Zenigata. He pulls the handcuffs harder.
Luckily, the laws of physics prevents their immediate fall, each countering the other's pull in yet another gymnastic performance.
Zenigata has just enough time to grab onto his hat before Lupin pulls in a final effort that gets them stumbling onto the floor to safety. The detective doesn't have time to gloat before the thinner man launches himself onto the hat.
"-Give me that !, Lupin pants,
-MY HAT !, the detective howls for the third time.
-If you're going to risk both our lives, at least make it worthwhile !
-That hat is of utmost importance you scoundrel !"
And with that, Zenigata hurls himself over Lupin.
If anyone passed by, they would have been the spectator of a slap fight between two grown men, handcuffed at that. Unluckily for both duelists, no one but cacti were witness to an increasingly pointless series of jabs and thrusts, and a whole bunch of shouting.
And that's when a small tink was heard, stopping both of them dead in their agitation.
A key.
The theorem was simple to figure out, really, but it took them a while, knee deep in dust and still punch-drunk. If they were handcuffed, it was because of Zenigata, therefore that key was their shortcut to one's win and one's doom. No doubt the detective would have the thief walking all the way to some police station in those same handcuffs they were currently sharing. And so both gave each other a look, understanding shining in their eyes, before hurling themselves onto the small deliverance.
If anyone passed by, they would have been the spectator of a fight to the death, where punches and kicks were real this time, uproar and the desire to one-up their opponent into submission fueling both duelists. Fists and feet were thrown around in a peculiar dance that was often curbed by the handcuffs, until both realized it could be a leverage instead. That's when it happened.
The fight, progressively losing heat, had both opponent huffing and puffing when Zenigata, in a final attempt, launched his leg into nowhere. Both the key and his loose shoe followed the momentum, and Lupin and Zenigata helplessly watched the key, and the shoe, get thrown off over the ledge, absolute dismay plastered on their faces.